


i don't want to hurt you (but i don't have a choice)

by soyybeanboy



Series: the essek saga [4]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Crying, Dungeons & Dragons References, Emotional, Gen, Mind Control, Possibly OOC?, adventurer!essek, battles, i dont know but i tried!, not beta read we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-08
Updated: 2020-11-08
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:54:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27458311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soyybeanboy/pseuds/soyybeanboy
Summary: During a battle against a succubus with the Mighty Nein, Essek finds himself charmed. He once told the Mighty Nein offhand that he could kill them easily - he never thought he’d be forced to prove it. But as the succubus forces his hand to attack his friends, he realizes he might have no choice.
Relationships: Essek Thelyss & Caleb Widogast
Series: the essek saga [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1999450
Comments: 4
Kudos: 72





	i don't want to hurt you (but i don't have a choice)

**Author's Note:**

> This already happened in the show to Caleb, yes. However, consider this: Essek+crippling guilt at almost killing his friends. Fun, right?
> 
> Feel free to point out any spelling/grammar mistakes you find! I edited this myself, so I doubt that it's perfect!
> 
> Enjoy the feels! <3

“Essek,” A voice whispered, muffled against the sharp ringing in Essek’s head. He blinked rapidly, wincing as a pounding headache throbbed to life behind his eyes. The space around him was busy, thrumming with activity, but all his attention was focused on the voice.

“Hello, lovely,” The voice whispered, much clearer than it had been before. It was was so melodic, so sweet. Essek spun in a clumsy circle, searching for the source. “Over here,” it said, and Essek turned on his heel to face it.

Beauty stared back at him. The form was immaterial, shifting and breaking and re-forming over and over again in a way that Essek’s brain couldn’t keep up with. It had thousands of faces, and no form.

Essek reached out, wanting nothing more than to touch it, to make it happy, to let it envelop him in its warmth and take him away.

He’d do anything for it.

“They want to hurt me,” it said, suddenly only inches from Essek’s ear. “But you wouldn’t let them, would you?”

“No,” Essek breathed. “Never.”

Over his shoulder, Essek swore he could feel it smile.

“Then take care of them for me, my love.”

Energy thrummed to life in Essek’s hands as he muttered under his breath, tracing sharp-edged sigils into the air. Gray light began to pulse around his form, pushing against the suffocating darkness of the stone chamber that he stood in the center of.

Faces turned to him, faces he recognized. Beau, Caleb, Jester, Fjord, Veth, Caduceus, Yasha. Friends. At least, they hand been, until they’d decided to hurt the most divine creature he’d ever laid eyes upon.

“Essek, what are you-” A voice cried, their words lost to a violent rush of air as a black gravity well spread across the ceiling. Screams echoed across the chamber, but Essek barely heard them. _They had to die, to save this beautiful creature._

His grip on the spell suddenly shattered as a wave of bright, amber energy blinded him. Blinking away the lights that danced in his vision, Essek let out a cry of frustration and searched frantically for the source.

And there, scarcely 30 feet away, stood Caleb Widogast, arms outstretched as the last details of a dispel sigil burned away in the air.

Essek took off running, drawing a small knife from his belt and lunging at Caleb with all of his strength. The wizard barely ducked out of the way, stumbling across the floor as he cried, “Essek, snap out of it!”

Snap out of _what?_ This was all he could do.

He lunged again, this time catching Caleb in a side. Blood soaked through the heavy fabric of his coat and Caleb let out a gasp, clutching his ribs with shaking hands. “Stop it!”

Their eyes met for a split second, and somewhere, deep in the back of his mind, Essek registered the absolute terror on Caleb’s face. He realized, however briefly… _It’s me doing this. I could kill him._

Before he could ever decipher the swirling confusion in his head, the voice came back, urgent and commanding. “Kill them! Kill them!” It hissed. “Or they will kill _me_!”

Essek could barely choke out a word, scrambling to gather what was left of his consciousness before he slipped away again. _“Run.”_

Caleb thrust his hand forward, preparing a spell. Adrenaline coursed through Essek’s chest, and before Caleb could complete the incantation, Essek had a knife at his throat. He’d never been a physical fighter, and the strength that flooded his system now was unnatural. Veins bulged beneath the dark skin, the whites of his eyes flooding with red as the blood vessels began to rupture. He had no concept of time, no idea how long he’d been able to resist the urge to slit Caleb’s throat when a pair of hands, strong enough only to be Yasha’s, seized him from behind. A screech ripped itself from his throat as he thrashed against the grip. Caleb scrambled to his feet, seizing the dagger that Essek held and trying to wrench it away.

“ _No! No!_ ” Essek screamed, for it was all he could say. Two voices warred in his head, drowning out the sounds of everything around him. His vision grew blurry as he fought against the hands that held him and the voice that commanded him. He gritted his teeth and let out another cry, some mangled string of words that even he couldn’t understand.

His resolve was draining quickly, hands twitching violently at his sides. The ringing in his head grew louder and louder, the world spinning and shifting around him, until it all went dark.

When Essek opened his eyes again, he saw red.

The battle raged around him, and he could feel himself there, see through his eyes, but his body was not under his control anymore. Helplessly, he began to wrestle himself away from Yasha’s grip and bear down on Caleb, kicking his legs out from under him and pinning him to the floor, dagger in hand.

The cruel iron curve of the blade glinted in the flickering torchlight, and Essek felt himself _smile._ Disgust churned in his stomach, but there was no way to stop it. Teeth bared, body moving with unnatural precision as this cruel entity yanked him around like a puppet on invisible strings, he slowly raised the knife. The blade began to spark with power, and Essek recognized the swirling, silver-gray color of his own magic.

“Essek, fight it,” He heard Caleb say.

He couldn’t.

The blade dug into Caleb’s chest and the man cried out, his legs flailing uselessly as he attempted to escape. Shifting all of his weight to the top of the handle, Essek shoved downward again. Caleb’s ribs popped one by one as the blade of the dagger disappeared into his body, sending a spray of hot, crimson blood across the room.

Tears, salty and stinging, streaked down Essek’s face, mingling with blood that wasn’t his. One by one they dripped onto Caleb’s cheeks, each one a desperate, agonized plea.

“Essek,” Caleb whispered, a thin trail of blood rolling from the corner of his mouth.

Essek’s gazed down into the endless expanse of blue that lived in Caleb’s eyes. It took everything shred of will had to blink against the tears, soften his gaze, and return the desperate whisper. “Caleb…”

He twisted the knife.

In an instant, a hand seized the back of his neck and Essek gasped, opening his mouth to scream as a glittering ring of green energy erupted around him. As if it had never taken hold, the magic that stolen his mind faded.

“That was the last of my diamond dust! Did it work?” A voice that he knew to be Jester’s asked, close behind him.

“I don’t know, but don’t let go of him!” Another voice - Beau’s - cried out. Frozen in shock, Essek watched as Beau knelt beside Caleb, her body rigid with anxiety as she pressed two fingers into the pulse point on his neck. After a moment, she let out a heavy sigh of relief. “He’s alive!”

“Okay, get out of the way, I’m gonna heal him!” Jester’s hand was gone from his neck and she was at Beau’s side in an instant, pulling the knife from Caleb’s chest with a sickening sucking sound. Pressing her palm over the wound, green light flashed in her fingertips, filling Caleb’s chest with energy and slowly starting to knit the gash back together.

Caleb jerked awake, his body wracked with bloody coughs as he pushed himself up onto his knees. His eyes darted wildly around the room, searching for signs of danger. When he realized that the battle was over, his gaze locked on Essek.

And _Light,_ those eyes again. Watery and wide, they held such frantic concern. Caleb shuffled closer, seizing Essek’s hands and saying, “Are you alright?”

As Essek opened his mouth to reply, to say that yes, he was fine, and the more important question was if _Caleb_ was alright…he choked. The words stalled in his throat and all that he managed was a heaving, broken sob.

Squeezing his eyes shut, Essek practically fell into Caleb’s chest, wrapping his arms around Caleb’s neck. With his soot-smudged, bloodstained hands Essek held as tightly as he could, running his fingers along Caleb’s jacket, through his hair, tracing the curve of his neck. _Anything_ to remind himself that Caleb was here, alive.

“Shh,” Caleb’s voice was low as he returned the embrace, holding Essek close. “It’s alright. I’m alive.”

“I almost killed you. I _would_ have,” Essek said, his voice breaking. “In another second, you would have been dead, and it would have been _my fault_.”

His body shook with the force of his sobs, wracked with debilitating guilt as he clung to the man in front of him.

“It wouldn’t have been. It wasn’t.” Caleb hissed. His tone was so firm, so sure. “It was that _gottverdammt_ succubus, not you.” Pulling away slightly, Caleb cupped Essek’s face in his hands, pulling him closer until their foreheads rested against each other. “I know you would never hurt me.”

“Never,” Essek said. “I didn’t want to do it. I tried to fight it, Caleb, but I wasn’t strong enough.”

Caleb shook his head. “If you had truly been unable to resist, I would be _dead._ I have been charmed by such an entity before. To say a word of your own, to pull your attacks in even the most imperceptible ways…that takes an _immense_ amount of will.”

Caleb stood, offering Essek his hand. Hesitantly, he took it, letting Caleb help him to his feet. “Maybe we look into some better armor for me next time.”

“For the next time…I’m charmed by a succubus?” Essek blinked owlishly.

“Well, you never know.”

Despite the storm of guilt still swirling in his chest, Essek couldn’t help but return the slight smile that sat on Caleb’s lips. “So, a near-death experience is what it takes to get Caleb Widogast to crack a joke.”

Caleb chuckled, releasing his hold on Essek’s hand. “Now, don’t spare it another thought, _mein Freund._ I survived. None of the blame is yours. You understand?”

“If you say so, Widogast,” Essek said, and to his credit, he was only half-lying.

As they stepped into the dark, foul-smelling stone tunnel on the opposite wall, Essek’s eyes never left Caleb. Following him through the lightless tunnel, his mind spun like a top, trying to think of what in the _world_ could make up for this. Caleb may have forgiven him, but Essek was far from forgiving himself.

They walked in tandem, footsteps echoing off the stone, until the dim glow of a torch-lit chamber came into view.

Quietly, Essek leaned to whisper in Caleb’s ear. “I don’t know what we’re walking into, but I will do everything in my power to protect you, Caleb. I owe you that.”

“Haven’t you always?” Caleb whispered back, threading his fingers through Essek’s. There was a rare note of teasing to his next words. “Tread carefully, or you might lead someone to believe that we’re friends.”

They stopped before the archway, exchanging anxious glances as they wondered what dangers awaited them here.

Essek felt Caleb squeeze his hand. “I don’t expect you to shed the guilt like that,” he snapped his fingers. “But we do this together. Protect each other, _Ja?”_

Essek nodded, returning the squeeze. “Alright. Just…be ready to run.”

“I always am,” Caleb said. “Let’s go.”

And side by side, bolstered by their shared resolve, Essek and Caleb stepped into the light.

**Author's Note:**

> What can I say? I like to make Essek cry :3
> 
> I'm gonna be real with you guys, I'm not too proud of this. It was fun to write, though, so I figured I might as well share it! I hope you liked it, and I'll see you next time! <3


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